Story Excerpt

From "The Curve"
a story by
Felix J. McGillicuddy

“So, one day I was hunting quail in a thicket along Raccoon Creek, just below Grover’s house. It was getting late and I was skunked. I hadn’t even got a shot off. I knew I was running out of time, so I headed up stream to Sammy Ooley’s field. He had just picked his corn, and I knew if I was going to get Grover a bird, it had to be right there.”

“Sure enough, I hadn’t even stepped in the field yet and a covey got up. I cracked down on ‘em and saw two birds go down with one shot. I thought about trying to get ‘em up again, but it was getting dark and two birds was good enough. So, I stuck ‘em in my pouch and headed to Grover’s. He was wanting a bird for Sunday dinner and I had him one.”

“If he hadn’t had a kerosene lantern burning on the porch, I wouldn’t have been able to see his house. He didn’t have electricity and it was always dark in the woods. He was sitting in his rocking chair as I walked up the steps. I said ‘I gotcha one, Grover’. But, he was dead.”

“When he didn’t say anything back, I knew it was bad. So, I touched his hand and it was cold. It was still clamped on to the arm of the chair right here,” he said, showing where Grover’s hand had been when he died. “I sat on the step and cried like a baby.”